Who's Calling?
by Jyulin
Summary: Sam had a phone that was giving her strange calls. And it was just after Daniel died, so she didn't want to hear it. What happens when something goes wrong?
1. Chapter 1

By: Looneybin

Title: Who's Calling?

Time frame: Season 5, about the time of Revelations. I changed the episode in order to sort of meet my storyline. I can't copy the exact script for copyright reasons.

Disclaimer: I don't own Stargate, yada yada yada, I say all this obligatory legal mumbo jumbo.

Unless you're touched in the head, anyone knows that you should not shelter under trees or speak on mobile telephones in an electrical storm. It so happens, that Rachel Baird does both these things. When the rain starts pelting down while she is walking through the park, she finds a large tree and sits under it. She pulls out her cell phone and punches in a number. She puts the phone to her ear and says, "Hi Michael! It's Rachel."

Before she can say anything else, a bolt of lightning strikes her. Rachel is killed instantly, but her phone, however, receives a mere zap before flying out of her hand.

There are some questions that will unfortunately never be answered. Who is this Michael? Why did Rachel call him in particular? The solution will never be known. The only thing that is known is that he was the one called and he was a friend.

Anyway, police find her the next day. Her body is taken away and the phone is given back to the phone company, as it does not have any value in their investigations. The people at the phone shop put a new case on it and insert a new SIM card. It is then put back on the market. A woman comes along and purchases it. Her name is Major Samantha Carter.

* * *

It is a couple of days since Daniel died. Sam is sitting in her lab. She hasn't been the same since she lost her 'brother' of sorts. She feels as if she is in a constant daydream. Sam is in her lab, typing up a mountainous pile of reports that were due in ages ago. Her new mobile is lying on the bench next to her laptop. She still does not have a clue why in the world she bought it. It is of newer design, with a silver case and tiny blue numbers. The salesman had said that it was second hand but barely used. It had been cheap and her old one was broken so she had bought it without too much question. Sam's eyes are drooping shut. Her head rests on her arms and she falls into a light sleep. Then, an electronic noise wakes her up. It is her cell phone. She is confused. She has only given her new number to her friends and they are on base. Sam picks it up and presses the answer button. 

"Hello?" she says.

"Hi!" says the person on the other line. "I was wondering if you could give my wife a message for me. Tell her that the bracelet I gave to her under her desk."

"Wha...?" Sam shakes her head. "Who the hell is this?"

The man on the other end of the line seems mildly surprised. "Oh! My name is Rhys Hopkins. My wife is Lieutenant Linda Hopkins. Please deliver this message."

With this, the man hangs up. Sam takes the phone away from her ear and stares at it for a little while.

She has no idea of what to make of this situation, so she finds Lieutenant Hopkins.

"Your husband called me and said to tell you that the bracelet he gave you is under your desk," she says.

Hopkins glares at Sam. "Is this some kind of joke, _ma'am_?" Hopkins brushes past Sam and strides off, glancing back ather for a moment.

Sam has no idea what she did wrong. She goes back to her lab and pulls up the 'find' screen on her computer. She types in, Hopkins, Lieutenant Linda. The screen shows the woman she was just talking to.

Name: Hopkins, Linda

Rank: Lieutenant

Relatives: Mum and Dad Joe and Christine Bakgam'on, Sister Jessica Bakgam'on, husband Rhys Hopkins (deceased)

The last word takes Sam by surprise. She just manages to suppress a gasp before it escaped her lips. She closes the window quickly, not wishing to see those words any longer. Sam curls her hand into a fist and whacks her head as hard as she possibly can. She gets up from the computer and decides to take a trip to the commissary for some blue Jell-o.

She shuffles out of her lab and into the corridor, a whole heap of questions spinning endlessly in her mind. Sam is so lost in her thoughts that she collides head on with someone.

"Sorry," she mumbles. The person she had walked into was Lieutenant Hopkins. Sam tries to continue, however, Hopkins holds her up.

"How did you know?" she asks. Sam looks confused so she holds up her wrist. There is a beautiful gold bracelet attached to it. "It was just where you said it was. I don't know how you knew." She stops for a moment and sighs. "I guess what I'm trying to say is thanks." She turns and walks away.

Sam, given up on the idea of blue Jell-o, goes back to her lab and continues her report writing. Her cellular phone rings again. She picks it up.

"Hello?" she asks carefully.

"Hi! I am Emily. I believe you know a Sergeant Siler? I am his sister. I would like you to tell him that his book entitled'Backgammon: APlaying History'is beneath his report on the Stargate dialling computer."

Sam takes the phone away from her ear and stares at it. How the hell does this woman know about the Stargate? The woman on the other phone is still speaking as though everyone knows about the Stargate Program.

"Hello? Hello? Can you hear me? Hellooo? OK!Tell him immediately, thanks." The woman hangs up and leaves Sam sitting there. She goes and tells Siler the message. He too displays the same reactions as Hopkins. But he comes to her a little while later telling her that the book was exactly where she said it would be.

Sam tries to go back to her report writing, but is disturbed by receiving phone calls from the dead relatives or friends of base personnel, asking her to deliver their loved ones messages. Sam obeys, and in each case they found their lost belongings in the exact place that she had told them.

She puts the phone down and heads to Daniel's office, hoping that being there might give her help her. Once there, she looks around his lab. Sam spies his glasses lying on what looks to be some sort of diary.

"Whaddo I do Daniel? You would have known, and now you're gone." she says, sounding like she is about to cry and tears in her eyes. Sam picks up Daniel's glasses and looks through them. She puts them back down on the diary and turns to see General Hammond standing in the doorway. "Major."

"Sir!"

Hammond walks in. "I just wanted to inform you that Colonel O'Neill requests that you remain on active duty while we try to find a replacement for Doctor Jackson"

Sam sniffs. "So what are we supposed to do? Keep working like nothing happened?"

"I understand how you feel," says Hammond, looking down and avoiding her eyes.

"With all due respect, sir, I don't even know how I feel," Sam says, her eyes bloodshot and wet. "We didn't even have a memorial service."

Hammond puts on his best reasoning face. "We're not even sure if he's dead."

Sam is getting annoyed. "And that is the problem! What are we supposed to do sir? Wait and hope that he comes back, or...just move on?"

Hammond walks over to her and says, "When I was in Vietnam, I saw my best friend shot down. I know he lived; I saw his chute open. But I never found out what happened to him."

Sam has tears streaming down her face. "So what did you do?"

Hammond collapses back into soldier mode. "I learned to live with it."

He walks out, leaving Sam all by herself. She suddenly realizes something. She hasn't got a call from Daniel. Which means either a) he can't call her on her 'Dead Phone' as she named it or b) he isn't dead. Whatever the answers are, she half walks, half jogs out of Daniel's office to find Colonel O'Neill.

He is walking down another corridor. Sam catches up to him and says, "Colonel, we need to talk."

O'Neill has obviously been expecting this conversation and replies almost immediately, "I don't want to hear it Carter. This is the job; we lose people all the time." He continues walking down the corridor, his pace quickening.

"But this was Daniel we're talking about." She tries to reason with him. He is unwilling to listen to reason.

"What do want me to do? He's gone! I can't change that." O'Neill walks away before she can say anything more. Sam sighs, turns and walks back the other direction. She does not go back to her lab. She goes to the locker room, sheds her green SGC uniform jacket and replaces it with a black leather one. She grabs the keys to her Harley Davidson and heads to the surface. Sam puts on her helmets, jumps on and leaves, heading toward her own house where she can grieve peacefully.

I'll deal with the punishment later, she thinks to herself.

However, the event transpires that there is a terrible accident on the highway, involving a lorry, an old useless handy van and a Harley Davidson motorbike.

Back at the SGC, a briefing has been called for SG-1's next mission. Not one of the members have seen Sam since she attempted to speak to O'Neill. He opts to go to her lab and see if she's there. On arrival, it is apparent that there is no one there. O'Neill looks around the back of her desk in case she collapsed or fell or something. There was nothing. He goes to leave. But an electronic buzzing stops him. It is Sam's cell phone. Since Sam is not there, he decides to take the liberty of answering it for her. After pressing the answer button, he discovers that Sam herself is on the other end of the line.

"Hi, sir," she says. "It's me."

* * *


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter 2

"Hi sir, it's me."

O'Neill looks at the cell phone, a confused and almost pissed look on his face. Sam had known that they were still on active duty and yet, if she is calling herself on her mobile, she is most definitely not on base. Having little time to ponder this, he says, "Carter, where the _hell _are you?"

Sam does not respond straight away. She waits a moment, trying to find a way to word what she has to say. She has, however, no intention to tell him where she is or why she isn't at the SGC.

"Sir," she starts finally. "I need you to do me a favour." Without waiting for him to say something in reply, she continues. "I need you to tell my dad something. I need you to tell him that-"

O'Neill has no idea what is going on, and it really annoys him.

"Argh! Carter! What the hell is going on? You're going to see him in a couple of days, god dammit! You don't need me to tell him anything!" He doesn't usually speak in metaphors, but this was an exception; the time bomb0 was ticking and he was about to explode. "Carter, I want you back on base, right now! That's an _order, _Major!"

Sam seems unconcerned that her CO is giving her an order. "No can do, sir. Please tell my dad that I have changed where I keep the key; it is now under the doormat. Tell him this."

O'Neill opens his mouth to say something, but Sam has already hung up. He heads back to the briefing room, thinking things over and the cell phone still held in his hand. Carter has had her insubordinate streaks, but not like this. He walks into the briefing room with Teal'c, General Hammond and Doctor Fraiser staring at him. Just by the curious glimmers in their eyes, they are expecting an explanation.

General Hammond is the first to break the silence. "So? Where is she?"

O'Neill shrugs. "I don't know, sir, but she's not on base. She...uh... she called herself on her mobile phone." He hands the phone to Hammond, who displays an expression of misunderstanding. O'Neill continues. "She said to give Jake the message that her key is under her doormat. I have no idea what it means, sir."

Everybody in the room exchanges glances, everybody asks themselves the same question, which basically is **_WHAT THE HELL IS GOING ON?_**

General Hammond is the first one to speak, yet again. "Colonel, you check her house and see if she's there. Teal'c will go with you. I'll check to see if her credit card has been used from here. Let's move, people."

O'Neill jumps out of his seat, Teal'c rises slowly and reverently, General Hammond stands up, goes into his office and picks up the red telephone.

Sam's House

O'Neill steps out of his truck, followed closely by Teal'c. O'Neill goes up the steps leading to her front door and knocks loudly. When there is no reply, he shouts her name. He is now genuinely pissed. While O'Neill is banging on Sam's front door, Teal'c is calmly standing on the driveway, noticing that her motorbike is nowhere to be seen. He decides to check around the back. He jumps the fence and scans her back garden with his eyes. There is nothing. Teal'c goes back to O'Neill.

"SamanthaCarter is not here, O'Neill," he says, his voice full of regret. Jack is pulling out a lock pick and attempting to open her front door. The lock will not budge. Sam's voice rings in his mind.

"_The key is now under the doormat."_

O'Neill kneels down and retrieves the key from beneath the annoying brown mat that reminds him of excrement.

Hesteps into the hallway. There is nothing missing. No personal items taken from shelves, no mess everywhere to indicate hurry to leave, nothing but an awkward silence.

The SGC 

Hammond has checked Sam's credit card details and rung in every marker that could help him find some trace of where she has been. He discovers that her credit card nor anything else useful that could help track her has been used. He sighs, realizing that Sam would not have been stupid enough to use her credit cards while she was on the run. Even so, he is concerned. He picks up the newspaper that is lying disregarded on the floor and starts to flick through it. On the third page, he sees a headline, 'FATAL CAR CRASH KILLS ONE AND LEAVES TWO OTHERS INJURED'. His heart drops into his stomach as he reads the opening paragraph. Hardly any of it goes into his brain; he can only see the words that he doesn't want to. _Harley Davidson motorbike in crash...rider killed...woman...blonde...five-nine-ish... _

The next thing Hammond knows, he has picked up the phone and is telephoning the morgue. The phone is ringing. The sound is eerier than the floorboards creaking when you're alone in the dark or an owl hooting while you're walking through the forest at night. A man on the other end picks the phone up. Hammond asks for the name of the woman killed in the car crash. The man at the morgue answers. He feels defeated. He is the one that has found Sam, but she is not in the state that they want.

O'Neill and Teal'c are summoned back to the base. They are confused; Hammond has told them that he has found Sam, but wouldn't tell them where until they are at the SCG. If Hammond has learned anything, it is best to tell someone that one of their close friends or family members has died face-to-face and not over the phone. O'Neill walks into the briefing room with Teal'c at his side. Hammond is sitting at his usual end of the table, his hands in his lap and slightly puffy eyes.

_He looks like he's been crying, _noted O'Neill notes silently.

Hammond heaves a huge sigh, as if to get himself under control. O'Neill starts to feel really weird. He feels like there is tragedy clinging to everything in the room. O'Neill suddenly realizes what has happened and feels a wave of dread wash over him.

Hammond speaks. "Jack, Teal'c, I have some bad news. Sam…" He pauses, his voice being all wobbly. After what seemed like forever, he continues. "Sam was killed in a motorbike accident. I called the morgue and apparently, she was there yesterday afternoon."

O'Neill is shocked. His eyes are wide- he cannot believe it. Then, something occurs to him.

"Sir," he says, already having a hard time keeping control of his voice. "If Sam was killed yesterday afternoon and I got that call from her this morning, who was it that I spoke to earlier?" He is desperately trying to find a loophole in the general's story.

"I don't know, Jack, but it wasn't Sam Carter."

"Then who the hell was it then?" O'Neill feels the colour drain from his face.

Hammond shrugs, regret hanging heavily in his appearance. "I don't know, Jack."

ΩΩΩΩΩ

At the Morgue

Teal'c, O'Neill and Hammond walk into the freezer room with all the other dead people.

_So many dead, _thinks O'Neill. _It's goddamned ridiculous. _

The small man guiding them through the sea of corpses stops rather abruptly at a gurney. He turns to the remaining members of SG-1 and pulls back the cloth covering one of the corpses so that the face is visible. For O'Neill, everything is going in slow-mo. The cloth is peeled back until Sam's head is visible. The small man backs away. It is undoubtedly his fellow colleague, his friend, is lying there, dead. Her face is covered in severe bruises and a series of clean, yet disturbing, deep cuts in her forehead and in her temple. O'Neill is shaking, not only with cold, but also with disbelief. Without saying anything else, he runs out of the morgue and down the street. Hammond and Teal'c stare after him. They have not seen him like this before. Hammond goes to follow, however Teal'c stops him.

"Leave him be," says the big man. "He needs time to grieve."

Hammond nods and turns back to Sam, biting his lip violently in attempt to keep himself together.

O'Neill is slows from his running. He is now in the park, which is a fair way from the morgue. The park is empty, and rain is teeming down like the tears on his face. He stops for a moment, resting against a tree and thinks how stupid he must look. He feels really bad; his last words to her were chucking her own sadness and her own feelings back in her face. She had always had time to comfort people; when Sha're died she was in the infirmary with Daniel offering him a shoulder to cry on or a friend to turn to. Now that Daniel was gone, she had been offered no such support. She had just dealt with it her own way and now look where she was.

Or where she wasn't. She wasn't supposed to be dead: she was supposed to behere with him.

He hears the thunder rumbling loudly. It has been a while since he left the morgue. A tear trickling down his face, O'Neill sits out of the rain, beneath the tree. All of a sudden, Sam's mobile phone rings. He takes it out of his trouser pocket and stares at it. He presses the answer button, but just stares at it in his hand. He can hear Hammond calling his name on the other end. O'Neill is about to drop it when a bolt of lightning strikes the tree. He feels the electricity jolt through his body; he feels almost relieved. He is killed instantly. The phone merely receives a zap before flying out of his hand. No one will find him 'til early tomorrow. He never reports to work again. His phone is given back to the phone company with a new SIM card. Someone buys it. As soon as they get home...

"Hello? This Jack O'Neill here. I was wondering if you could give General Hammond this message..."

* * *


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter 3

Hammond walks into his office and sits down. He sets up his iBook laptop and starts to work. It is Monday; Monday the 13th. He doesn't usually believe in that sort of superstitious nonsense, but this week has been really weird. First Sam calling Jack _after _she died and Jack disappearing. He had never acted like that before, Hammond had noted. Anyway, life did not stop and he still had a job to do, even without one of his best people and friends. He starts to tap absent-mindedly at the keyboard, and soon enough, he finds himself playing FFX Runner, his reports open in another window.

After about a half hour or so, there is a knock at the door. Quickly minimizing that window, Hammond instructs the visitor to enter. Harriman Davis enters and launches into an annoying rave in his best monotone about the latest tests on the gate and power usage and finally, after what seems like hours, personnel that have failed to report for duty.

"…all systems are back on line and Colonel O'Neill has not yet reported for duty."

Hammond looks at him with eyes that clearly state, 'you serious?' The poor guy is thinking, 'Oh man, what have I done wrong?' The general redirects his glance and dismisses the technical sergeant before picking up the phone and dialling in Jack's home phone number. He does not answer; before long the answering machine kicks in and Hammond hangs up. He rings his mobile phone number, but some annoying woman simply says, "This number does not exist or the phone has been switched off. Please check that you have entered the correct number, or try again later." He throws the phone down as if it was a poisonous spider and checks everything that might help him to locate his friend. His credit card had not been used, he hasn't used him mobile phone. Hammond suspects that Jack is still feeling responsible for what had happened to Sam; he finds that in most situations where something goes wrong or someone is hurt, he tries to blame himself. He had noticed that, in particular, he did this when the victim of these incidents is Sam Carter. Perhaps Dr. Frasier had not meant to let it slip that they felt for each other a little _friendlier_ than friends, but she had. Hammond thinks that he should see if Jack is alright. Even if he was at home, he probably still wouldn't be answering the phone. He instructs Major Griff to take command over the base until he got back. He jumps in his car and drives to Jack's place. He is in such a hurry that he does not even realise that Jack's car is still in the parking lot: exactly where it had been two days ago.

Jack's Place

Hammond pulls up in the driveway. He steps out and slams the door after him. He walks up the path and knocks on Jack's front door. After a minute of silence and nothing happening, Hammond knocks again. This time he calls Jack's name. There is nothing. He pulls a lock pick out of his jacket pocket and lets himself in.

_Jack probably wouldn't answer the phone or door if he was really depressed, _thinks Hammond, brainstorming the reasons why Jack wouldn't be here. He inspects the whole property: three times. There is nothing. No signs that Jack has even been home. No sign that Jack had left. No sign of anything.

The Base

Hammond sits down at his desk again. He stares at the jumble of papers that need to be sorted out. He disregards them and continues thinking where Jack could be. Possibly he was at Sam's house. Perhaps at the morgue. He didn't know where Jack was, and it was beginning to worry him. Jack usually never ran from things. He was one who faced them, head on. _Well perhaps losing Sam was too much for him, _sighed Hammond.

About a half hour later, Jack is still not on base. Hammond has looked in his office countless times and called his place at least thrice. There is no sign of him. He relents. He had not wanted to call the morgue because the people probably were starting to get the impression that he wanted someone dead. Anyway, Hammond picks up the phone and dials. The same man that answered when he first rung answered. Hammond is starting to get annoyed with his voice.

"Hello," says Hammond, trying to keep his voice even. "I'm General Hammond, and I was in earlier this week with a man about…"

The man interrupts. "Jack O'Neill? Yeah, we've got a Jack O'Neill in here."

"He's there?" says Hammond. "Let me speak to him."

The man pauses for a moment. "No. Uh, maybe you didn't understand me properly. He's not at the morgue; he's _in_ the morgue.

At the Morgue

Hammond comes in. He walks up to the front desk, where a woman is typing. He goes up to her. "Excuse me. I need the possessions of a Jack O'Neill. He was brought in here on Friday."

The woman looks up, looking unconcerned that Hammond might have known this man well. "Oh, yes. I'm very sorry. I can give you a few of his possessions; however his phone has been given to the phone company. They gave me a call yesterday as well. They have sold it. It is protocol that any item that has been resold from here that we receive their address and name. I can give you them if you want.

Hammond looks down. "Yes, thank you, I'd like to get the name and address of the buyer." The woman gives the name, address, Jack's dog tags and his sunnies to him. Without a word, he turns and leaves, the door squeaking closed behind him.

Buyer's House

Hammond knocks. After a moment, a young woman opens the door.

"Yo," she says. "Wassup y'all? If da people in yo' 'hoodz are sellin' stuff, well we ain't interested, man." She begins to close the door, but Hammond keeps it open.

"Did you buy a second hand phone the other day? From the store down the road?"

The girl looks at him. "Yeah, they said I'd have to give my name and address 'coz it was from the morgue, y'know. It's been really weird. I've been getting calls from these really whack people that I don't even know, askin' me to tell people stuff." It appears she has only just noticed that Hammond is wearing air force blues. "You General Hammond?" Hammond nods. "Some dude called Jack O'Neill told me to tell you he's sorry, man. I don't know what for; the dude wouldn't tell me."

Though kind of shocked, Hammond continues. "Well, I'd like to buy it off you. You see, it's very-"

"Nah, dude," says the woman. "Yo' can have it 'coz these calls are driving me whacko, you dig?" Even though Hammond doesn't speak da streetz on a regular basis, he does understand and the woman gives him the phone before closing the door in his face. Hammond looks at the cell phone in his hand. _All right,_ he thinks. _What's going on? Jack is dead; he can't have called anybody. Could he?_

The Base, More specifically, Hammond's Office

He is pacing around his office, thinking the last couple of days over. Who the hell had the idea to leave Jack be? Why didn't he go after him? Hammond clenches his fists and kicks the wall like he was David Beckham striking the scoring goal. His foot feels like a lump of wood afterwards but it helps manage his anger. The phone rings. He picks the cell phone up and answers. Jack is speaking.

"Hello, sir. Did you get my message? I'm sorry I couldn't tell you myself. Anyway, how are you? I didn't mean to leave you like that, by the way. I…I just couldn't deal with it sir."

Hammond stares at the device. "Who are you? Jack is dead; there is no way he couldn't be. I demand that you tell me why you are playing this prank…"

He continues for a while. Jack is obviously getting annoyed. "Sir, are you done yet?" he says. "It's me, Jack. Anyway, I'll see you soon." The phone goes dead. Hammond places it back on his desk and bangs his head on the concrete wall, hard. Having no idea what to make of the situation, he just sits there, feeling a little dizzy.

Before long, the phone rings again. He picks it up, this time more hesitantly. Jack wasn't on the phone again, but someone else was.

"Hi, sir, it's Sam here."

Hammond performed the same routine that he had with Jack with Sam - demanding that she expose her fraud, demanding her identity and all that dramatic stuff. She too claims to be Sam Carter; the Sam Carter that Hammond knows to be dead. He hangs up and chucks the phone into the trashcan. He is feeling very angry. Is this some kind of practical joke? Who is actually on the other end of that line? He growls in frustration and hurls something else across the room. Hammond goes back to playing FFX Runner as he cannot think of a single to do or to say or to express his anger in the most civilized fashion.

He's doing quite well; the FBI van in the game has just got crushed and Hammond has passed the first lot of boom gates. He gets himself past a sticky situation and…the phone rings again. He is annoyed; he had hoped when he had thrown it in the bin, it would have broken and he would have no longer bothered him. But, obviously not. Feeling a little guilty, he answers the cell phone, vowing that it would be the last time.

"Hello?"

"Oh! Hello sir! Still around, are you?"

Major Kawalsky? What next?

This time Hammond drops the phone on the ground and stamps on it. There is no way that it could still be working. After that, he gets his sorry ass down to the infirmary thinking, _am I going crazy? What the **hell** is going on?_

Infirmary

"Well, sir, I can't find anything wrong with you," says Janet Fraiser, looking through her test results carefully.

"They were on the phone. I heard them. I heard them!"

Janet looks at him. "I'm sorry, sir, who was on the phone?"

Hammond gives her a look to say, 'like, duh'. "Jack, and Sam, and Major Kawalsky!" His is weird; he sounds kind of excited.

"Sir, you said that Colonel O'Neill and Sam were dead, and Major Kawalsky has been dead for over four years. You couldn't have been speaking to them on the phone."

Hammond's look changes. He is angry. "I spoke to them! Don't you believe me?" He gets up and holds Janet up by her collar.

"Airman!" She yells, struggling against her CO. A couple of airmen from outside restrain Hammond and take him to a holding room while Janet calls County Mental Health.

County Mental Health: Room 203

Hammond is sitting alone in a rubber room. He is thinking. Again.

_All I seem to do these days is think, _he revises, poking at the walls for no reason in particular. He hears the door unlock and turns his head. Doctor McKenzie and his bunch of psychologists walk in, about two of them each holding a needle. McKenzie smiles. Hammond almost throws up. If McKenzie noticed, he didn't say anything except, "time for your shots, General."

Every four hours, they came in and did this. Hammond's condition didn't change a little bit. He kept on yelling at them how Jack and Sam and Major Kawalsky had called him and that they had to believe him. Gradually the doses got bigger and bigger, and more frequently. He knew that it was a matter of time before he could handle no more.

He hears Doctor McKenzie come in. He is holding another syringe. Hammond gets up to, uhh…convince the good doctor that he is telling the truth. McKenzie is too quick for him; as soon as he saw Hammond moving, he jabbed the syringe into his arm. Hammond feels himself falling, as if in slo-mo, as the sedative started to kick in. He falls the short way back to the rubber floor. He is completely still. His does not draw breath. His lymph nodes are clogged with the drugs he does not need in his system. Hammond will not wake up. His last days were spent as a suspected lunatic.

After another four hours, McKenzie walks in with his medicine and all that crappy-do. He is expecting to be almost strangled, but isn't. He sees Hammond lying on the floor, motionless.

_The drugs should have worn off ages ago, _he thinks to himself. He goes over and checks for a pulse. He does not find one. He looks at the medical staff at his heels.

"He's dead," McKenzie says. "He didn't need the medication. Either he was allergic to all of the drugs that I gave him and it just took a while to show or he was telling the truth about his dead friends calling him."

Unknown Location

Hammond opens his eyes. He is lying on a floor, but not the rubber floor of the mental institution, but a hard, stone floor. He picks himself up, feeling rather confused. The last thing he remembers is having the sedative injected into him. He remembers the feeling of life slipping away with each passing moment. If this is not the rubber room at the mental institution, he is dead. Hammond looks in front of him and behind him. The corridor he is in extends for miles in either direction. He chooses a path at random and starts to walk down it. Suddenly, he hears a voice in his head.

_No,_ it says. _Not this way; you are supposed to go the other way._

"No," says Hammond. "I will not listen to you. I will go this way."

Hammond finds himself on the ground, as quick as a flash. Red light is gushing out of his eyes, nose and mouth. The pain is almost unbearable. The pain stops as quickly as it started. Hammond picks himself up off the ground. But he feels something different. He tries to take a step, but he can't. He tries to say something, but his lips won't form the words.

"We must go and find Jack and Sam," Hammond hears his mouth saying. But he is not the one saying it. He attempts to say something. He is now the voice in his head.

_Why? Why do we need to find Jack and Sam. Are they here?_

"Yes, they are here. Before we say anything else, I would like to introduce myself. I am Tetrium, and I was made and implanted in your brain by your people. They combined chemicals that produce our species. We are created to control in the afterlife. I have full motor control of this body. You will not override me. Your people are the reason I am here. They are the reason why _you _are here. You need to help me reclaim power over this afterlife."

_No! We don't need to take control. They have done nothing._

"Oh, yes they have," says Tetrium. "They left you alone. Your wife, Jack, Sam… They are the reason you were put in the mental institution. If it were not for them, you would be still alive. I would not exist. So I am thankful you are here. You will help me gain power."

_Are you an idiot? They're dead! I'm dead! We're all dead! We're all equal! No one can have more power!. _

"I have been in this situation before," says Tetrium. "You forget this. I know something you do not."

Hammond yells, but can do nothing to prevent the oncoming event.


	4. Chapter 4

Chapter 4

A/N: I apologise for this bad chapter. I have vowed to finish all of my fanfictions, and, well, this is one of my fanfictions and I am going to finish it.

Sam stirs and abruptly sits up. Her thoughts immediately jump to the fact that Daniel is dead. She feels tears start to well up behind her eyes. She blinks them back angrily, not wanting to lose it. She suddenly realizes where she is: or where she isn't. The place is dark and eerie. Sam gets up. Feeling unsteady and confused in her new surroundings, she leans on what feels like a stone surface to get her balance.

As she makes her was across the corridor, holding onto the wall, she sees the smallest bit of light in the distance. Unknowing what to do, she walks toward it. Every step she takes, the light gets bigger. Brighter. More beautiful. It is right before her now. She extends her hand to touch it.

Sam stops just short of it, the slightest bit worried. A bright light at the end of a tunnel? It sounded like a near-death experience story.

Flash

_Sam put on a hard face so that no one would bother her on the way to the surface. She could feel the tears that formed behind her eyes, threatening to fall. She angrily fought them back as she put on her helmet and mounted her motorbike. Why would no one understand? Her best friend had died, for God's sake! Could everyone just brush him off like a piece of dirt? She turned the engine on and kicked off. She had to get home. She would take her phone off the hook. She would turn off the lights. No one would know anybody was in there. _

_She took the entry onto the highway, her thoughts understandably elsewhere. She rode smoothly along the high-speed stretch, following a Daihatsu Handivan. It was a short distance ahead of her. Then, suddenly, it stopped. Sam slammed on her breaks, but it was too late. She careened into the car, which sent her flying. From then, everything seemed to happen in slow motion. The other lane of traffic was still moving, not yet aware of what had happened. She somersaulted in the air, her stomach turning over. Then, she saw it: the semi-trailer. All she remembered was the feeling of terror as her eyes widened and she took a sharp breath inwards – her last. After that, a slight impact on her shoulder and she was drowning. Drowning in a sea of her own memories. She saw her friends laughing at her as she struggled, trying to get to the surface._

"_Stop laughing!" she yelled at them. "Stop it! I didn't want this to happen!" But the Colonel, Daniel, Teal'c, Janet and Hammond only laughed harder. She fought to the surface once more, only to be dragged back under. Something had caught hold of her ankle and was pulling her down, down, down…_

Flash

Sam withdraws her hand very quickly with a gasp. She gulps as the memories come flooding back. Memories of floating into the air, as thin as a slip of paper, and looking down on her body: a bloody mess, with her hair that may as well have been red stuck to her face and bruises in amongst the remains of her helmet.

Then, as if someone had eased her into a bath of cool water, she felt calm. She was dead, but death didn't seem too bad. Her worries of what Teal'c and the Colonel would say when they found out what had happened floated away.

_Anyway_, she thinks sleepily as she extends her hand to touch the light once more, _if they cared about me as much as they did Daniel, they'll get over it quickly._

Deep within, she knows that she's being unreasonable, but she no longer cares. The light is warm beneath her fingers. She feels a strange sensation of losing all control of her body, but she simply closes her eyes and lets whatever is happening, happen.

* * *

Miles and miles away, there is Tetrium. He has managed to find his way out faster than Jack or Sam. His objectives have changed. He has learnt very valuable things in the short time that he has been in this second life. In fact, he has learnt three extraordinary things. But not all of them will only benefit him. All of the second world inhabitants possess the knowledge that he possesses, but very few use what has been given to them. But Tetrium will not disadvantage himself. He will find Jack and Sam. He will find them, and when he does, he will throw them back into the mortal world. He smiles. All he must do is wait and stay out of their sight.

_They probably haven't even made it out of the tunnel yet_, Tetrium said to himself. He went into a nearby dwelling. It was deserted. It seems when there is a new arrival, a new dwelling appears for them. He enters and looks at the simple layout and furniture, disgusted.

_Pitiful accommodation, _he thinks andlies down on a bed. He closes his eyes. Sleeping might point out something in his plan that he may have missed. After all, a dream is a question we have not yet learned to ask.


End file.
